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Basically, I say "First, do no harm." I think that people should work for changes where they are, because they have better access to information about local happenings. I doubt any use Perl; readers, for instance, have actually been to Afghanistan recently.

Focusing on local problems also prevents local strongmen from distracting us from our problems by saying "Look! Over there!"

But again:), the UN Security Council has determined, and reaffirmed in dozens (?) of resolutions over 12 years, that Iraq must be disarmed. France has agreed, Russia has agreed, China has agreed. That Iraq must be disarmed is, in the UN Security Council, not a matter of debate. And your ideas, while interesting, do not address that mandate.

Fine, don't trust them. It doesn't change the fact that the Security Council has decided Iraq will be disarmed of NBC weapons and missles that are capable of execeeding a 150km range, and that if inspections fail -- as they have failed, and continue to fail -- then further steps will be taken to effect that disarmament. Frankly, if you aren't acknowledging these facts in the discussion, and talking about how to disarm Iraq, you're just making noise. It's like going to a business meeting on how to cut exp

1) The governments on the Security Council don't really care what you or I think.2) As you say, they will do various things -- I fully acknowledge that they will probably invade Iraq and install some sort of authoritarian military regime, and keep a US military presence in the country indefinitely.3) I think that these actions will not really help anyone. The likelihood that the actions will take place doesn't affect whether I support them or not.4) The behavior of the US government *is* an issue here.

2) I don't know who "they" is, but as I gave evidence of in the previous discussion, all the actual evidence I've seen shows that the US will not installing anyone into power, and that the person the US has given its blessing to (who is making a move for power of his own accord) is anything BUT authoritarian. I prefer to look at actual evidence when available than to speculate wildly.

The bottom line is that you are arguing against war, and completely ignoring the whole point of the looming conflict, and yet you still apparently want people to take you seriously. That's a shame.

So what you are looking for, from me, is some other mechanism to liberate people from nasty governments, that doesn't involve conquest by nasty people?

(PS have you looked into the history of US government policy in Latin America? It is the area where the US government has had the most freedom of action over the last fifty years, and so is fairly instructive as to what these people want to do. Do a search for "Operation Condor," for instance.)